


Little Wounds

by whisperbird



Category: Tiger & Bunny
Genre: F/F, Gen, can be seen as mildly shippy, or just very very strongly friendshippy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-21
Updated: 2014-12-21
Packaged: 2018-03-02 13:43:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2814071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whisperbird/pseuds/whisperbird
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everyone tells Pao-Lin who how to do everything in all aspects of her life. That's what it is to be young, be a girl, be a hero, right? She struggles to find allies in her fellow heroes, and find people who understand her need to be herself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Little Wounds

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Andraste](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Andraste/gifts).



> This is set before the Jake-arc. You can probably set the close of the story right before the Jake-arc. No spoilers for the movie, since in the canon timeline this in pre-movie. (Also, I use "he/his" pronouns for Nathan, as I've been told he ID's as agender and accepts several kinds of pronouns. I haven't seen the movie yet, so apologies if this gets explained otherwise. It wasn't my understanding and if I do find out a later date I may edit accordingly.)

A cold day in Sternbild, with clouds hanging over the city the color of a cement block and looked about as heavy, and impenetrable. Gloomy, disheartening, promising chilly temperature and only teasing about rain.

 A _teasing_ of rain was fine to Pao-Lin. More than fine, actually – it was _great_. Who ever wanted it to rain on a cold day anyway? Even if it wasn’t cold enough to snow (or nowhere near it) it was cold and windy enough that rain would feel like watery bullets pelting your skin. Not painful but uncomfortable and annoying. It was depressing and days like this that made Pao-Lin sleepy and think of television static, that kind of dull monochrome, the clouds only differing shades of one singular color gray.  She wanted to yawn instinctively, thinking of sleep, but realized the Hero TV copters might circle by any minute now from her vantage point here on the building and yawning wouldn’t come off the right way, perhaps. She’d been given another one of those _talks_ last night and was wary to repeat the experience.

They made her feel silly.

She couldn’t keep herself from thinking of it while she waited, even though she tried to focus on everything else possible.

The image floated in unbidden, the night skyline of Sternbild to their left and the disapproving face of her caretaker across the table, concerned but exasperated.

“You’re coming across as too strong.”

Pao-Lin had leaned forward on her elbows incredulously. “I’m a hero. What am I supposed to do?”

“No, no … your persona.” A sigh. “We want you to get the points, look good, understand, but the way you come across—“

“So … really, what do you want me to do? I do team work good enough right?”

“Channel your aggressive nature into more … moxie.”

“Moxie?”

“Chutzpah. Pluck.”

“What?” Pao-Lin had sat back, laughing.

“Don’t be aggressive.”

“You wouldn’t tell Origami Cyclone this.” It had come across petulant, but it was a good point. Pao-Lin felt she’d gotten better at arguing her “case” over the last few months. Self-awareness led to pointing out micro injustices in her day-to-day life. Karina applauded her efforts, when she thought they were warranted. Nathan encouraged her. 

She wasn’t trying to be difficult, but all the same she’d crossed her arms, as though underlining her point.

“Origami Cyclone doesn’t have the same persona as you.”

“Cause he’s a guy, right?”

A louder sigh, both understanding and condescending at the same time.

Thinking back to this now only distracted her and made her feel bitter. Widening her stance, she planted her legs firmly into the concrete of the rooftop, calves taut and steeled herself into the wind, raising her staff. At that exact moment, as if on cue (it was on cue; just not her cue) a helicopter whipped overhead, cameras pointed directly at her back and Agnes’ lilting voice came over the airwaves, faraway in the studios,  filling her ears: “Bonjour, heroes!”

Bitterness, bad weather or not, it was show time.

*

If Pao-Lin thought about it, she wouldn’t change it, not quite. She made the choice to move to Sternbild and become a hero when she was young, but even now that she understood more about herself she understood more about how much she enjoyed what she did. She’d trained in martial arts for many years as a small child, learned to understand her powers, their nuances and hone her craft. It came to _this_.

And she did enjoy it. She enjoyed the spotlight too, the fans, the parties and this aspect of it most of all – the wind raking coldly through the few loose strands of her hair as electricity crackled through the metal in her hands, slamming her staff down into the street to stop the man she pursued dead in his tracks. He was the second of the band of criminals to break away from his gang and she’d cornered him.

He’d been terrified when he’d seen her land gracefully onto the street, silent as death until the moment she descended, her face and his widened, shocked eyes illuminated for a moment by the bright band of electricity she’d conjured. It had done the job as a sort of electric fence. He’d stopped, pleaded for mercy looking at this tiny girl before him as though he wasn’t aware heroes didn’t kill. But she looked a creature that might, her eyes burning blue with NEXT power, tiny strands of hair standing straight upon her head only visible by contrast of electricity and the ambient dinginess of the cloudy day. She’d only scared him and got points for the capture.

Then she’d assisted Blue Rose in taking down the third burglar, who had been lurking nearby, flattened against a dumpster, shaking. She’d come in from above, again and was surprised it worked a second time. Karina hadn’t needed her help in all honesty, but Pao-Lin provided a great diversion as the camera bore a hole in Karina’s physique and she was far too into this aspect of it to stop the show. When the announcer was done undressing Karina (a fact they’d both gag over later privately) she could engage properly. It’d only taken them a minute then to apprehend the guy and he’d seen his buddy get stopped in his tracks. They were all talk, no show. All bluster. As soon as a hero showed up they quailed. It was a good fight, but easy take-ins.

And that. That part Pao-Lin definitely enjoyed.

As for the other things? The quibbles about her attire, her demeanor? Even the way she wore her hair? It was part of this inevitable job dissatisfaction. Try as she might to argue her points, like the night before, it wasn’t so much a lack of understanding as a lack of not caring. She was an actor, almost, an entertainer.

“Didn’t you know that when you signed up for it?”

Karina rolled her water bottle in her hands, and frowned. “I don’t mean that to sound harsh,” she followed with. “I mean, that’s just part of the job, you know?”

“You’re so bad at morale,” Nathan replied, but he was smiling. Karina’s frown only deepened, her brows knitting as she glared.

Pao-Lin blew her bangs from her forehead in an absence of anything else to do while she was thinking.

“Just last night, like I said … I know I can’t be myself, but sometimes I don’t feel I can be my best. Does that make any sense?”

“Yeah.”

“Mmhm plenty.”

“Listen to you guys, building confidence and muscles.”

From the corner of her eye, Pao-Lin saw a flash of light brown hair as Karina affixed the glare back to her face and pointed it jeeringly at the weight benches. Pao-Lin turned herself to see Kotetsu lying on his back, a set of weight suspended before him, no effort having been made to lift them thus far. It seemed he’d just been lying there on his back for a few minutes, listening.

“If you needed a way to get into the conversation you could’ve picked a less lame one,” Karina muttered. She rolled her eyes, lids fluttering.

“I didn’t have one,” Kotetsu said. “So I didn’t try.”

“Then just join the conversation like a normal person!”

“She’s got a point, there.” Nathan shrugged, though Kotetsu couldn’t see it, still lying prostrate on the weight bench. “You lost your normal person credentials a while back lounging on a weight bench and eavesdropping.” He smiled though, and his smiled infused his words. Nathan had that way, and Pao-Lin always loved that. No matter what his temperament, he knew how to let you know what he felt through voice and words alone. He was great at communication.

He had so much patience and good humor. He was an aspiration point in that aspect for Pao-Lin, as far as many others aspects and she was glad she had a person like that, a person like him. She knew he saw himself as a guardian and a guiding figure and relished the role. The ability to be teasing, diplomatic, likable, kind, intelligent seemed too elaborate and faceted for one human being sometimes, let alone for one person in one single conversation. And yet, that’s what talking to Nathan felt like.

Kotetsu knew this of course, that Nathan’s needling meant no ill will, as they bantered with each other. He wasn’t irritated as he finally rose from the bench bent at his hips in a way that Pao-Lin felt a vampire might. Stretching his arms out in front of him he groaned and then snorted at Nathan before stretching again. “I got so stiff layin’ there. I can’t bend anything.”

Karina rolled her eyes again, flared her nostrils. Pao-Lin pointed out a few weeks ago to Nathan that she didn’t understand why Karina would be so rude to Kotetsu, and Nathan had confided a hunch – just a hunch – that she might have a slight crush on him. It was more than a hunch but Nathan felt an awful gossip, since Karina wasn’t there, but it was plain as day, wasn’t it? Not to me, Pao-Lin thought and said as much. And since when did Nathan even feel guilty about being a gossip?

But now that he’d pointed it out, she couldn’t stop herself from seeing it and it seemed overly dramatic and comical. It was actually funny.

“I was intending,” Kotetsu started, by the time he’d stretched and squatted his way over to their circle of conversation near the bench, “to lift a few, but …” His hand came to rest, warm and heavy on Pao-Lin’s shoulder and the timbre of his voice changed.

“I know she’s got your best interests, and I’m not the best person to tell you to listen to what sponsors want, this whole glamour—“

“I don’t mind the spotlight,” Pao-Lin admitted readily, not a lie in the least. “I just don’t like the way I’m put into it is all. I don’t fit that.”

Kotetsu shrugged, but he seemed to get it. “For me, that’s the whole focus and shine, y’know that crap, being put into that makes me hate the spotlight.”

“We’ve heard this before, Tiger,” grumbled Karina. “We get too caught up in our celebrity and don’t worry about doing good, right?”

“Eh, well, right, but you don’t have to say it like that …” Kotetsu rubbed the back of his neck, losing his steam and quailing under the sudden and potent criticism.

He scratched his beard in thought. Nathan drummed his fingers on his bicep, arms crossed and waiting for Kotetsu to get his second wind like another bout of Hundred Power.

Kotetsu’s back then stiffened, standing up straight and raising his hand upward, as if in salute. “But!” he said, more loudly. “Even if I just believe it. That’s why I believe, right? I don’t care if you kids think it’s dorky. You always have.”

He patted Pao-Lin’s shoulder and the gesture seemed to convey a sort of white flag. It was just his eyes when she looked up as he turned away; they were smiling, but he looked apologetic somehow.

*

 

“Where are we? It’s empty.”

Pao-Lin’s eyes darted to overpass to their right. The entire expanse of the curved wall under the bridge was filled with graffiti, which was typical for the city, typical for the Bronze District especially but in the center of all the conventional scrawls was a large burst of the most curious art.

Near the sidewalk were bubbled letters spelling names illegibly, and tags that were in impossible places near the top. But in the center, that red burst, hot against the dark, dirty gray wall. It was badly done. Pao-Lin thought it was supposed to be a rope, maybe, like a circle of rope. From a distance, it was so deformed and weirdly drawn it looked like a snake eating itself; that was silly though. Whoever made it was a bad artist and already people had begun painting things over it and in a few months it’d be gone forever.

She forgot it in an instant when she heard Karina scoff. “We’re in the slums. We’re heading to a parking garage right now.”

They’d just stepped off of the bus at a stop several blocks away, as though the bus was wary of traveling this far. Pao-Lin said this, still looking about.

Karina pursed her lips. “Are you really afraid?” She put her hands on her hips in an authoritative stance. “You can make lighting. I can freeze people. That’s not a good point.”

“I’m not afraid!” Pao-Lin shot back, more loudly than she’d intended. “Just confused.”

“Well …” Karina cocked her head to the side. “I bought a car. This is the pick-up location. Anyone else, anyone who wasn’t a NEXT wouldn’t do this, but what do I have to be afraid of? I have cash right here,” she said, pausing she pat her jean’s pocket. “And I got a very good deal on SternbildList.”

“Why not go to a dealership or something?”

Pao-Lin was looking around for the car, but there wasn’t a parking garage in sight or a parking lot, just that overpass, a bunch of tiny streets lined with rundown buildings. The tiny streets had oil stains and garbage smashed in the gutters. It wasn’t a very lovely place.

Karina’s cheeks flushed. “I do have the money in savings. My parents said I can’t have a car ‘til college.” She deflated suddenly, blowing the bangs floating askew from beneath her knit cap off her face. “I don’t even know if I want to go to college. Is that remotely fair? I make my own money.”

“You make your own money,” Pao-Lin conceded, hoping it didn’t sound sarcastic, but she was preoccupied for a second. She was never the kind of person to fuss about cleanliness but almost stepping in someone’s used wad of dried gum was very unwholesome. Karina must be desperate to be in such a place.

“I drive this thing for a while, then I’ll sell it and get whatever I want. In the meantime, I just want something. It’s the principle of the matter. If it’s shady, so be it. I’m more of a grown woman than anyone takes me for.” She shrugged, palms up. “According to the guy, and without getting out my mobile because there’s something about it tracking my location that skeeves me, it’s that way …” She jerked her thumb in the direction opposite the heavy graffiti-covered overpass.

They stepped off the curb, looking both ways, though the traffic was minimal at best, resigned to a few rambling, noisy trucks. It was a warehouse area and not a used one from the looks of it. It had that appearance and smell of disuse, like an old empty trunk at the back of a closet. One of the buildings they passed was almost entirely destroyed by a long-ago fire, but it was after they rounded that building a small parking lot came into view.

“Garage, lot same thing.”

It was a small comfort that it was sunny today, and pleasant. The bright blue sky was crowded with a bit too many off-white clouds, but sunshine peaked through and shimmered down upon the rooftops of the few cars parked there and on a few bits of broken glasses on the pavement, winking for a second like diamonds.

In the corner of the lot was a gorgeous red convertible and Pao-Lin knew before Karina made a bee-line for it that it was the car. On the opposite side of the car a dark form was standing, a man looking at his phone, and then he rolled around to lean on the trunk, waving lazily before Karina reached the car.

“Hey, from SternbildList, right?”

“I don’t know why else I would be here.” Karina laughed.

The guy looked like a Chihuahua. Pao-Lin stood back at the dip where the road met the lot. She wished she had a detection method for NEXT. She wished she knew if people would be trouble before they became trouble. She was just glad Karina had sense and Karina had brought her along. Both of them were perfectly capable of taking care of themselves, especially if he was just a regular guy.

It seemed he was.

Karina handed over what looked like the tiniest sum of two thousand Stern dollars. Had someone died in the car? Did it even work? Karina had had the same idea.

But before Karina handed him the money, he’d turned over the engine, she’d looked inside and ran her fingertips over the leather seats. It was as the listing had promised, apparently. He’d just wanted to be rid of it, Karina had said earlier the listing mentioned. He was moving out of Sternbild, back to the country for a simple life, getting rid of all of his big city items. He’d had an epiphany.

Pao-Lin heard his greasy voice carry over the parking lot as he explained it. Karina was replying with a lot of grunts, not particularly caring for his story. Eventually, he got the hint, and smiled a gap-toothed smile, and stalked over to a slim motorbike next to a broken parking meter a street adjacent.

He put a tiny helmet on, just large enough to get by helmet laws, and thanked her, before roaring the engine on and streaking off. It left nothing but a lot of noise in his wake. Pao-Lin watched him ride the stretch around the road and disappear behind the building before she jogged across the parking lot to Karina.

Karina’s eyes were glazed over lustily.

“Let’s drive,” she said with almost childish enthusiasm.

Pao-Lin had to admit it looked nice enough. Hopefully it worked as well as it looked. She wasn’t skeptical; the engine turned over, the entire thing was in working condition. If it was something else, she could get that fixed right?

They both jumped into the car. The seats were nice and expensive-feeling, the seatbelts didn’t feel very tight. Pao-Lin thought this is what you might call a luxury car. It even smelled new, not like a smoker or dogs. Hopefully everyone on the dashboard worked.

“The radio works,” Karina said, as if reading her mind. “Everything came on like it should. I read a little bit on the internet last night and it looked like the radiator was okay, and the gas gauge but you know if the major stuff is okay, I can fix it. He said it might have a few miles on it, but whatever. It’s never had a wreck and its two years old.” She took a deep breath, hands at ten and two out of habit. “With specs that good and a price this good, it’s almost criminal.”

It dawned on her and Pao-Lin at the same time, but neither of them said anything.

Karina didn’t take her eyes off the windshield, hands still on the handsome brown leather steering wheel. “Even if it was stolen,” she said finally. “It wasn’t my fault.”

“Do you have the guy’s number?”

“I do actually.”

“That’s evidence.”

“That is evidence.” Karina smiled, genuine and warm, excited. “I’ll buy you lunch. Let’s roll up in this for sushi.”  
“Do you think I can be bought with food?” Pao-Lin adjusted her seatbelt and raised an eyebrow. She could be, but that wasn’t the point.

Karina snorted. “I asked you to come as a friend. You’re a good friend of mine, you know? Sometimes you’re one of the only people who understands.” Her face was glassy with a glum expression, just a flash, but it was there.

That made Pao-Lin think of something she’d wanted to ask.

“Does it ever annoy you how Mario introduces you?”

Karina barked out a laugh.

“When I’m a singer, I won’t mind a lot of things. But they keep going back to this, this sort of … dominatrix thing!” She wrinkled her nose. “I just don’t like the things it encourages fans of mine to say at all. Mario just milks it.” She enunciated every word of the last sentence, punctuated with scorn.

“Let’s not talk about that,” she concluded. “I brought you here, because you’re my friend. And you’re my friend who can kick ass like me if anything made us kick ass.”

Pao-Lin liked this side of Karina. It was a side they both shared, the side that knew what they wanted and hated being told that they didn’t know what that was.

Karina put the key in and turned the ignition, the mirror checked, car in reverse, everything in order. She backed out of the parking spot a few feet and stopped, testing the brakes.

“Feels good …” she said to herself.

She switched on the radio. Loud thumping hip hop. She switched off the radio and nodded. She rolled the windows up and down. A nod. Then the locks, and windshield wipers and the A/C. The very moment the dial switched to high and cold air discharged from the vents, tiny bits of something came pouring out, hardly visible at first, glittering in the bright sunlight.

Pao-Lin swiped a hand across the dashboard, and saw a smear of blood in its wake. She looked back at Karina and then the vents, where larger, but still small shards of what they both realized was glass was pouring out of the vents like snow and filling the car, blasting from the A/C.

It had happened in less than 30 seconds, Karina fumbling to turn the A/C off at the same as they threw off their seatbelts, unlocked the doors and tumbled out of the car.

The seats were covered in a light but dangerous layer of glass-dust. Karina shook her shirt, glass falling from it, like snowflakes.

“Never had a wreck, huh?” she snarled, looking at the car. The engine was still running. She reached a hand in and gingerly turned it off.

No sooner than Karina had shut the door, then Pao-Lin realized the car was very, very hot, heat radiating from the hood and below and she tugged on Karina’s sleeve to step back. It had been on for less than five minutes, but the car was giving off immense waves of heat. They watched as it pinged for a second, then there was a loud pop and black smoke poured from underneath the car, thick and contrasting strongly as it flowed up against the bright blue sky.

Karina gave a strangled cry and took off her wool hat. Her jacket was leather, and she had on denim jeans, same as Pao-Lin. Pao-Lin had on a cotton t-shirt with a large decal on the front. Not much glass clung to either of them, and the seats and everything else was leather. Clean-up was possible, but careful. It didn’t matter now, the car was smoking. It was filled with glass, and smoking.

Karina snarled again and kicked the tire angrily. “Never had a wreck, huh?” she snapped again. “The only thing that could do that was what, if the windshield was crumpled into the dashboard like a plastic cup? The front smashed?”

“At least now you know why it was so cheap,” said Pao-Lin. “It might’ve been … destroyed before. It might just looked like it worked … I mean, the bright side is who knows what it might have been like if we got out of the parking lot and it did that.”

“ _Men are liars_.”

 

*

Nathan waved his hand.

“You don’t need me to tell you something was stupid.”

“That’s exactly right,” said Karina. Pao-Lin said, nothing, sitting back in the plush chair, full of sushi and happy. They’d taken the bus to a nice restaurant and then the train to Helios headquarters. She was trying to pay attention but it was warm in here and she was trying to figure out if the plant in the corner was real or fake. Of course it was real, Nathan thought faux anything was tacky, but it had this waxy look. There was real dirt in the pot. Her eyelids felt heavy.

Nathan’s relationship with the hero business was unusual, since he owned his own corporation. He answered to no one essentially, but was sophisticated enough as a businessperson to not need to exercise that. They came to his office many times out of costume, but his employees knew them as two girls he was mentoring in the fine art of business.

The woman CEO who attended meetings, the people of the board Nathan mentioned, they all understood what Helios owner did. And to hear the people in the office talk, they liked it when the girls came to the office to see him. Taking time from his busy schedule to advise young women and be the support they might need to navigate the shark-filled waters of Sternbild’s business scene. They were half-right.

He sat behind his large desk, one immaculate eyebrow raised. “Why didn’t you just come to me in the first place? Going to SternbildList is like shopping in a toilet, honestly.”

“My dad doesn’t want me to make big purchases like that until college.”

“So, naturally you did that.”

“Hey, I don’t need judgment.”

“Where is the judgment?” Nathan asked, placidly.

“In your _tone_.”

“I’m trying to help you, girl, seriously. So, I’m going to be honest. If you’d ask me to help before, no I wouldn’t have gone behind your father’s back. Would Tiger? Would Sky High?”

“No.”

“Would Bison?”

“Why would I ask Bison?”

“A lack of options.”

Pao-Lin couldn’t help herself and giggled suddenly. It seemed to ease Karina. It always made Pao-Lin feel bad the scorn she had for Antonio, but that wasn’t the place. She just needed to wait and let the two of them agree on something right now.

“Okay, point taken.” Karina still bristled. “All I want now is to just be rid of everything. I’m out a little over two thousand dollars, which makes me feel really stupid. And there’s a dud of a car in a parking lot that I bought. I just don’t know what to do.”

“It’s very adult to admit that.” Nathan nodded his head, even though Karina looked doubtful. “The most mature thing you can do is admit you don’t have the answers.”

“Didn’t Tiger tell you something like that a few weeks ago?” Pao-Lin pointed out, because it reminded her and it was true.

“Shut up,” muttered Karina, at no one in particular.

“It’s true, no matter who says it. It’s only little kids who think they can do everything.”

Nathan waited for her response.

“So.” Karina sat up. Her hair was still mussed, windblown and tousled from her wool cap’s absence. She waved her hands as she talked, in a gesture that seemed like a little kid trying to wave something away. “Can you at least help me fix it and sell the car? You can put the money in a college fund.”

“Do you want it in a college fund?”

Karina dropped her hands into her lap, leaden. “No one asks me what I want.”

“I’m asking you.”

“No. Put it in a whatever fund. If it’s a college fund, whatever, if it’s a car fund whatever.”

“If it’s a house fund,” said Pao-Lin, with a tiny smile, trying to think of grown-up things to tease Karina. Teasing Karina or finding Karina things to tease brought her from the brink of stress in an instant Pao-Lin had found more and more. It was a matter of shifting focus. “A baby fund.”

Karina flushed bright red and shoved Pao-Lin sideways. “A never fund!”

Pao-Lin struggled to regain her composure as she saw Nathan smirk and say, “An older boyfriend fund.”

Karina lost it.

*

Nathan hired a mechanic, found a buyer and put the money in an account, all within a month. Karina conceded that Nathan was one of the only men who wasn’t a liar. Pao-Lin reminded her that even though Nathan didn’t mind being called “he”, he was agender, wasn’t he? It was a word they’d learned recently. She’d agreed and said that’s why he got it.

That’s why he “understood.”

There were layers of people who “understood”: NEXT as a whole, then when you got down to Karina and Pao-Lin and Nathan, who were different from the rest of the heroes, gender-wise. And then Karina and Pao-Lin, because they were very young and it was hard for either of them to make decisions for themselves and have those opinions be regarded as something worth listening to.

*

It was back to raining weather again, and this time it was more than promised. Great thick raindrops falling, rapid winds. There wasn’t any thunder or lightning, just steady persistent rain and the windows on the side of the gym looked like little rivers. The world seemed underwater.

Almost everyone was there, except Nathan who was understandably busy and Kotetsu, who’d breezed in a bit later.

Pao-Lin pounded the treadmill and it was the only thing she could do in weather like this that made her (and everyone else, from the expressions on their faces) want to curl up and sleep. At least the clouds weren’t the color of dishwater, if that made any difference.

She idly listened to Keith and Ivan talk, Ivan slumped as usual like wilting flower on a weight bench.

“You see, that’s sort of the opposite of a problem. It just feels weird.”

Keith looked confused. “It hurt your feelings?”

“Not really … well, would it hurt your feelings if someone got you a gift card for your birthday?”

Keith smiled. “No, I’d just be glad they thought of me.”

“And see,” said Ivan, looking up, his bangs, flopping, “that’s why I feel guilty, because I don’t feel grateful. I don’t like shopping for clothes, so I feel like my mother is trying to tell me I dress terrible.”

Keith patted him on the shoulder. “Take it as a nice gesture! She loves you!”

“She thinks I dress like crap.”

“You do dress like crap,” said Karina. She was lifting free-weights nearby. “I mean that in the nicest way possible and I’m going to offer to take you shopping. You bring your gift card and I bring the knowledge you lack.” She brought the weight into a curl and regarded him, totally serious.

Ivan ran his hands down his face. “Okay, we can do that. I don’t mind that I guess. Sure. I’m just embarrassed.”

“Where would you have wanted a gift card from?” Pao-Lin asked.

Ivan looked up, his pale face slightly pink. He coughed. “Um …I’m into Japanese culture so...”

Antonio had been leaning against the wall, regarding out the rainy sky in a way he probably thought was romantic. Barnaby had been working his chest earlier with a press machine and now took a break on the bench drinking water and ignoring them arguing over what Pao-Lin had heard him sigh and say was “pedantic things.” He wasn’t ever rude to any of them but he got exasperated at times with individual neuroses. Karina had once remarked, “Like he doesn’t have his own crazy.”

Kotetsu blustered in ten minutes later, shirt dappled with dark spots of rain.

At least three people came to attention when Kotetsu walked in, Antonio turned away from being the hero in his own inner romance novel, Barnaby sat up and Karina turned her head. If Pao-Lin hadn’t been looking for Karina to notice, she wouldn’t have at all. But Antonio and Barnaby were obvious. They both sort of snapped to attention. Kotetsu noticed none of it. Even Keith would notice that. Kotetsu was just especially oblivious when people paid attention to him then whined when people didn’t.

“Ehh, it’s like a shower out there. I probably won’t need one after I work out.”

“That is disgusting,” Barnaby said, but without much conviction.

“The rain can be nice,” Kotetsu replied.

“I don’t like hero-ing in it,” Ivan said, “It’s annoying enough to run errands when it’s storming, let alone trying to do a TV show.”

“I bought some bread on the way over here for dinner tonight,” said Keith mournfully, “it’s soaking wet.”

“Why didn’t you close the bag?” Keith looked at Karina as though this were a novel idea.

“We’re not being forced into it with cameras on us,” Ivan pressed. “I’m dry, I’m okay.”

Kotetsu waved his hand. “Just change your way of thinking. Firefighters, cops, doctors. They all have to go out in the rain. If there is a job to do you do it.”

“That’s very inspiring, Mr. Wild,” Keith replied and Kotetsu took the praise. 

“Do you remember when HeroTV first started for us,” said Antonio, a quick glance to Barnaby unnoticed by Kotetsu but not by Pao-Lin and probably everyone else. “And one of the first nights we filmed it was storming, and you told me that. It’s good advice still.”

Kotetsu’s face was surprised, mildly so, for a moment. He blinked and then smiled. “Old man stories,” he said with a laugh. “You and I were top of the ratings!”

“That’s maybe why you have to think it’s a TV show,” said Karina flatly. “Things change.”

“Things change,” echoed Barnaby, to Karina’s obvious ire.

“What changes?” Antonio scoffed. “Things don’t change unless you let them. Or unless you make them. Either way.”

“Listen to you,” Karina said, keeping her voice cool. “I mean, you may not be top of the rankings, but you’re a grown guy. When you started out, did you wear like, a bikini and have guys call you on radio shows and tell you they’d been naughty and needed some discipline?”

Antonio’s eyes were round as saucers.

“It’s just different. Things change, and if you have the means to resist and do your own things, great. But sometimes, people do what they have to. I took this gig to be a singer.” She paused, and Pao-Lin heard the clink of the weight resting on the floor next to her. “It became more than that and I’ll tell you, but that’s why I took it.”

“So you’re saying there’s not a place for heroes?” asked Kotetsu. His voice was even and diplomatic, and Keith relaxed a little next to Pao-Lin. Keith hated when everyone argued; it made him tense. He had been riled up for an impending one.

“No. I’m just saying, what motivates one person might not motivate another until like …” She looked at Pao-Lin. She stood up and walked forward, stopped a few feet from Kotetsu. “Let’s say tomorrow I wanted to do something else entirely. Could I? Yeah, if it sold. Sex sells.”

Antonio nodded. “Even in the broader scope, we’re all just hanging onto what works.”

Karina stopped, opened her mouth, closed it. She swiveled and looked at Antonio. They locked eyes for a moment before Karina finally said, “Actually, you know, that is my point. Some of us might have an easier time than others, but that’s my point right there.” Antonio nodded again, one subtle bow of agreement.

Pao-Lin recognized one of the broader scopes of understanding, as between NEXT, and the people here in the room employed by HeroTV.

She turned the treadmill to cool off and began to slow her pace.

“You know what?” Karina said. She pointed at Kotetsu, “You stay an old dad hero, and the rest of you do what you do. I’m going to take a shower.” The flopped the towel over her shoulder, smiled graciously and walked off into the auto-sliding doors.

Not awkward silence, but the only sound was the slowing pace of Pao-Lin’s treadmill.

“Sometimes I wish this was a reality show all the time for only one reason,” said Ivan, breaking it finally. He sighed. “I’d hate that but sometimes moments like this would make for good reality TV.”

Kotetsu was the first to laugh, and he really meant it, doubled over. Ivan looked startled, because he might not have meant it to be funny, but he smiled and everyone else began to laugh, and when Pao-Lin stepped off the treadmill everyone was hysterical, laughing with each other. Barnaby allowed himself a smile, not being the type for big belly laughs at the moment. They weren’t even laughing at Karina, or what Ivan said. It was suddenly just the absurdity of the situation, of life. Sometimes things were just incredibly funny.

*

In the bathroom, Karina was brushing her hair out, preparing for a shower. She’d told Pao-Lin it got waxy if she didn’t brush it out after sweating in a ponytail. She regarded Pao-Lin in the mirror before the sinks, looking at her reflection instead of turning around.

“I didn’t just humor Bison, you know,” she said. “I actually agreed with the old fart on something for once.”

“He’s always lowest in the ranks,” Pao-Lin replied, watching, almost mesmerized, as Karina’s long hair slid through her brush. “He’s a nice guy. He means well, I think. If anyone knows what it’s like to hanging on, though it’s him, huh?”

Karina giggled, but not unkindly.

“Were you saying that for my benefit?”

“Saying what?”

“About doing your own thing?”

“Bison gets it, and Tiger and them all get we have to perform to keep our jobs. When we were talking a while back and I disagreed and said it was part of the job when felt like you were being forced to be girly …” She stopped her brush and looked at Pao-Lin. “I was wrong. There are parts of the job. I’m not sure if that’s one of them.”

“You don’t have to apologize.”  
“That was my apology. I’m sorry.” Karina looked down at the sink, and pulled the brush a few more times through her hair, depositing it on the sink, top of her head sweaty and greasy now.

“Like I told Tiger, and like he’s told me, I guess, we have to be ourselves.”

Pao-Lin sighed through her nose and tried to not look sad. “How do we do that?”

“Focus on the part of the job we like, right?” Pao-Lin watched her stuff her brush, pony-tail holders and dirty towels into her gym bag. Karina smiled reassuringly when she lifted it from the floor, and the face was unlike Karina, who seemed so malcontent and frustrated. It was a face of assurance born from genuine need to show that to Pao-Lin and Pao-Lin was grateful.

She couldn’t help but mirror it, even if only minutely. Karina headed off to the shower.

“And just be glad we have someone else who understands,” Pao-Lin murmured to her retreating back. She’s said it low, but she knew Karina heard her and agreed.

*  
By the time Nathan had joined them later Pao-Lin and Karina had left and the rain had let up outside. The city had turned to inky black, the streets reflecting the night skyline in glittering puddles. The air was cold and felt clean and Pao-Lin breathed in deep on the way to what was home for now.

She had a few minutes to think, alone and dark and she didn’t like to be philosophical at all so she didn’t.

She heard someone in a movie last year say something like, “The road to happiness, Peter,” because the heroine was speaking to her lover at the close of the film, “is the joy in finding out who you are and finding out how to become that self.”

She hadn’t truly gotten that then because it sounded too pretty and far-fetched, but if she supposed, that was right. That was the whole point.

She pulled in more of the clean night air, stretched and yawned.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't written these guys in a while, but I had a blast finding my voices for them again, because I love them! I've always loved Karina and Pao-Lin's relationship, so making that the focus of the story was fun too. My only regret was not making Antonio more of a feature because he was in the first draft, but here's my apology to Antonio for ending up on the cutting room floor. You're a good kid, Antonio. You're the King of Heroes in my book.


End file.
